butlincat's blog - a blog...a seeker of the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth...

butlincat's blog...a seeker of the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth...

This site is shadowbanned, as daily viewing figures prove since March 2018, when before then the figures were 10 times as much as they have been since. "Shadowbanning" is the act of blocking or partially blocking a user or their content from an online community - see more: What is SHADOWBANNING: Twitter: are you shadowbanned? - truther sites are targeted, eg:NewsGuard Launches War on Alternative Media - "Censorship is the tool of those who have the need to hide actualities from themselves and from others." - Charles Bukowski

“As long as justice is postponed we always stand on the verge of these darker nights of social disruption”...so said Martin Luther King Jr. in a speech on March 14, 1968, just three weeks before he was assassinated.

Police admit spying on Janet Alder because of her campaign for truth about police killing her brother Christoper. [Death of Christopher Alder: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Christopher_Alder ] Despite this, the #spycops inquiry has refused to grant her core participant status. We have been honoured to have Janet speak at our events

Voices of the Spied On: Janet Alder

Janet Alder has been a tireless campaigner for justice for her brother Christopher who was killed by Humberside police in 1998. Police admit repeatedly putting her under surveillance, yet she has been denied ‘core participant’ status at the Pitchford inquiry into undercover policing. Public meeting organised by Campaign Opposing Police Surveillance, 21 January 2016.

Sunday, 6 August 2017

UNDERCOVER COPS: An inquiry just revealed how far the British state will go in its secret war on citizens + OVER 1000 POLICE HAVE CRIMINAL RECORDS

The cover names of three police officers who spied on political activists have just been revealed by an inquiry into undercover policing. The three officers infiltrated high-profile campaigns at a time of great public anger.Inquiry documents and secret intelligence reports reveal just how far the state went to undermine opposition to injustices. And understanding the response to that overreach is crucial to understanding what’s happening now.

A time of wars and strikes

The three undercover officers (UCOs) were assigned with the Special Demonstration Squad (SDS) and were operational from 1968 to 1976. They (cover names) are Rick Gibson [pdf] (deceased), Douglas Edwards [pdf] and John Graham [pdf]. An outline of their undercover activities is given in each document. The three infiltrated a number of political campaigns and organisations, including [pdf]Troops Out Movement, Vietnam Solidarity Campaign and anarchist groups. At the time, Britain was engaged in military operations in Northern Ireland that saw 13 civilians killed by British troops on ‘Bloody Sunday’. Britain’s ‘dirty war’ in the country reportedly left many more dead. Britain was also actively supporting the US in its war on Vietnam. But the authorities had not appreciated the level of discontent this would cause. And on 17 March 1968 a mass rally at Trafalgar Square saw 8000 of the protesters break off to head for the US embassy at Grosvenor Square. The ensuing battle was a key moment, with 300 protesters arrested:

But the police learned lessons from Grosvenor Square. And ahead of a follow-up demo in October of that year, a Special Branch document provided a list of around 50 ‘leaders’. While another report revealed anticipated numbers of activists; and properties that could be targeted. Such intelligence would undoubtedly be useful to UCOs.

Beyond protest

But the state feared far more than mere protests and another Special Branch document warned of revolution:This assessment was not far off the truth. For the militancy on the streets was followed by another form of resistance.The Angry Brigade appeared from nowhere, but carried out highly targeted attacks on government and police properties:

Journalist Martin Bright summed up the political climate the AB existed in:

It is difficult now to imagine the intensity of the times. Edward Heath was locked into a lengthy dispute with workers who occupied the Clydeside shipyards in Glasgow, which would eventually end with a humiliating climb down for the government. Internment was introduced in Northern Ireland and the Bloody Sunday massacre of civil-rights marchers in January 1972 happened while the Angry Brigade suspects were awaiting trial. One document found in the raids across London that weekend brought the three causes together in a mini-manifesto: ‘Put the boot in – Bogside, Clydeside – Support the Angry side’.

Back to the future

The SDS was not just a child of the 60s and 70s, its work and that of other undercover policing units continued over subsequent decades. And Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary subsequently revealed that a massive 3,466 undercover operations took place in England and Wales between 2009 and 2013 alone.The Undercover Policing Inquiry was set up in 2015 to examine some of the practices deployed by these units[is he serious?...ed....he's trying to be!...Ned.].But it’s taken two years for a small number of cover names of UCOs to be released. The inquiry will reveal more in due course, though as The Canary reported many undercover policing files have gone ‘missing’. [well, there's a surprise...NOT!..ed.].Citizen activists are demanding real names should be released too. Because many UCOs formed sexual relationships as part of their cover. Indeed, former UCO Andy Coles (his real name) was exposed earlier this year – not by the inquiry, but by independent researchers. And now he is under pressure to resign as councillor with Peterborough City Council. The inquiry has agreed the then young woman he’s alleged to have exploited will be a ‘core participant’ in its investigation.Regardless of the difference in technologies used, there are clear parallels between the political policing of earlier decades and of today. Moreover, public anger about the same injustices is no less palpable.Get involved!– Check outUndercover Research GroupandCampaign Against Police Surveillance.Featured image via screengrab.source: https://www.thecanary.co/2017/08/05/inquiry-just-revealed-far-british-state-go-secret-war-citizens-videos/

posted here on Saturday, 22 April 2017

UNDERCOVER COPS: The Women Activists Who Fell In Love With Police Spies And Are Still Waiting For Justice

‘I suddenly realised after he had gone that I had no way of tracing him.’

05/04/2017 06:58

200

When Alison* told her family that her partner, who had disappeared without a trace after a five year relationship, was actually a police spy, her suspicions were dismissed as those of a spurned spouse.

The pair had began their relationship in May 1995 and it wasn’t long until they moved in together. It seemed like the “ideal” relationship, Alison recalls. But one day in 2000, she came home from work to find that Mark had disappeared, leaving only a note. Alison has not seen him since, but she wasn’t alone.

Between 1968 and 2008 Scotland Yard’s Special Demonstration Squad (SDS) deployed undercover officers to infiltrate hundreds of political groups. In an information gathering exercise, male police officers struck up relationships with female activists, often lasting years and sometimes even resulting in children.These officers told lies, created completely fictitious personalities and seduced scores of female activists into affairs in a bid to infiltrate groups fighting for environmental, political and social justice causes.

HUFFPOST UK

Alison was in a five year relationship with an undercover police officer who vanished while she was at work

On Wednesday, the Undercover Policing Inquiry will hold a hearing to determine whether to give the Met a time extension to submit anonymity applications for officers formerly employed by the SDS. Campaign groupPolice Spies Out of Lives was set up to support legal action brought by eight women tricked into long term relationships with undercover police officers. Activists have accused the police of “delaying tactics”, but the Met says it is “responding in line with its (the inquiry’s) timescales”.

The launch of the inquiry helped to bring women’s stories out of the shadows and the Met has admitted that the long-term sexual relationships instigated by officers with activists were “abusive, deceitful, manipulative and wrong”. In an apology issued in November 2015, Met Assistant Commissioner Martin Hewitt said the relationships “should never have happened” and admitted they “were a gross violation of personal dignity and integrity”. Yet there are still many women waiting for answers.

PA ARCHIVE/PA IMAGES

Doreen Lawrence, the mother of murdered teenager Stephen Lawrence, talks to the media, with her son Stuart (right) and Imran Khan (left) from her legal team outside New Scotland Yard, central London, following a meeting with Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe, to discuss claims that undercover police officers hunted for information to smear her family.“I would like the police to be there to protect people, I’m not surprised that police take an active interest in the politics of dissent but I don’t think anybody… thought that there was this level of infiltration – and infiltration on such a personal and intrusive and abusive level,” Alison, whose true identity has been protected, tells The Huffington Post UK.

“I think that my experience is the tip of the iceberg. I think that we don’t know the scale of it. Until we know the names of the undercover officers who were operating since the squad was established in 1968 and until we know the names of the groups that were spied upon, we really can’t understand the scale, we can’t know how big this is.”

What Police Spies Out of Lives want at the end of the inquiry

The cover names of the officers involved in undercover policing from 1968 onwards to be released.

The names of the groups that were spied on.

The files of all the people spied on handed over to the people.

A finding of institutionalised sexism in the police.

An awareness amongst the political class and society at large of the scale of surveillance of political dissent in the UK.

Mark told Alison he was a joiner from Birkenhead. He said that he was estranged from his mother and that his father had passed away when he was a child. The only family he said he had living in the UK was his grandfather. “A lot of the police spies, we have now found out, had painful and heartbreaking backstories,” Alison says.

It was only after he left that she became suspicious that he might not have been who she thought.

“I suddenly realised after he had gone that I had no way of tracing him,” Alison says. “In my address book he had scrubbed out really, really hard his grandfather’s phone number and address and he scrubbed out any other contacts that I had of people he knew… He destroyed any trace that there was and he wasn’t answering his phone and his phone then went dead eventually.”

It was only after a conversation with another activist soon after Mark’s sudden disappearance that Alison began to suspect he was a spy. “It’s nutty but suddenly it made sense,” Alison says. It would take another 11 years before her suspicions would be confirmed.'All he left was a letter.

Many would find it hard to understand why a police officer would strike up a relationship with someone just for being an activist. But Alison’s story is one of many and she still does not know why the police thought it necessary to infiltrate her life so deeply.

“Every target of this kind of abuse so far has been women,” Alison says. “We know of one female undercover officer who had a one night stand with somebody but all of these cases of long term relationships are male officers with female activists.

“And one of the things that we feel very strongly is that this is evidence for systemic abuse for years, decades, and of institutionalised sexism within the police and security services.”

Another woman who was targeted by the police in strikingly similar circumstances was Helen Steel. Helen was just 22 when she met John Baker while volunteering with London Greenpeace in the late 1980s. Unbeknown to her, the man she met was actually undercover police officer John Dines.

During the time they were together Helen was involved in the McLibel case. McDonald’s filed a libel lawsuit against her and fellow environmental activist David Morris over a leaflet that was critical of the company. Helen says that one of the authors of the McLibel factsheet was an undercover police officer. The drawn-out litigation, which lasted 10 years, made it the longest-running cases in English history and it was the subject of a Ken Loach documentary.

KIERAN DOHERTY / REUTERS

Helen Steel (L) and David Morris stand outside McDonald’s restaurant in central London following the McLibel court case.

Helen and John were in a relationship for about two years until he abruptly disappeared one day, only leaving a letter saying he could not cope any longer. It wasn’t until years later that she found out John had been working for a secretive police unit and had been lying to her the whole time..They seemed like the ideal man.

The pattern in each woman’s case was the same.

“It was only when we came together and discussed our common experiences that we realised a lot of the similar patterns of what was going on,” Helen tells HuffPost UK.

In any normal relationship you have tiffs every now and then but that generally didn’t happen… it just seemed like you had found this perfect relationship and it gave you a completely unrealistic expectation of what a relationship could be…Helen Steel

The experience left lasting emotional scars for many of the women who were targeted. Not only do they have to come to terms with the fact that their relationships were a lie, but it also led to a warped expectation of what a relationship should be.

“They all seemed like the ideal man. They were always supportive and charming and helpful… it’s always important to get on because if you don’t get on with people you don’t get information out of them,” Helen says.

“In any normal relationship you have tiffs every now and then but that generally didn’t happen… it just seemed like you had found this perfect relationship and it gave you a completely unrealistic expectation of what a relationship could be because they weren’t being themselves, they were just playing a part and their part was to get on with people.”.Paranoia

.

By forming a relationship with these women the undercover police officers gained credibility within the group they were trying to infiltrate.

Alison says: “I think I provided very good cover for Mark. I’m an honest person, I’m trustworthy, I’ve got a big family. I’ve got lots of friends and people know who I am and that I was who I said I was. And by being with me I think he gained a lot of credibility and trust.”

PA ARCHIVE/PA IMAGES

The experience also had an impact on the women’s relationships with their own families.

After Mark disappeared Alison started researching the security services, including MI5, in an attempt to uncover more details about this “spy” who had fooled her for so many years.

“I didn’t know what he was but I was convinced that he was (a spy) and with very few exceptions everybody thought I was mad,” she says.

“I was not well. I was up all night, I was logging cars outside my house, I was spotting people on the bus who I thought were following me, I thought my phone was tapped, I thought my emails were being monitored.

“My family – my brother, my Dad – just thought I was upset and traumatised by a sudden disappearance and that I had constructed some James Bond narrative to make myself feel better.”.State sanctioned ‘abuse’.

One of the most harrowing parts of these women’s experiences is that the deception was sanctioned by the state.

Alison says: “If somebody’s in a relationship with someone and it turns out they are a bigamist and a liar that’s appalling but it’s personal, it remains in the personal realm, whereas this is institutional. It’s paid for out of our money. We’re all paying for it as taxpayers. We’re funding it.”

“It’s paid for by the fucking state,” Helen interjects. “It wasn’t just the individual that was deceiving you but the whole apparatus of the state behind them. We were in the same flat, he had access to all my belongings, the inside of my mind, everything about me.”

This is institutional. It’s paid for out of our money. We’re all paying for it as taxpayers. We’re funding it.Alison

Alison says that all the male officers in the SDS had to be married so they would “have something to come back to”. Unknown to Alison, Mark had a wife and children the whole time they were in a relationship. John was also married.

“So not only did the managers and hierarchy in the police know about the operations, not only were they sanctioning the abuse of the female activists who were being infiltrated but they were also sanctioning adultery… The wives of these officers are as much victims of this whole experience as the female activists,” Alison says.

Alison says that she feels she was a “perk of the job” for Mark and suspects that many of the male police officers saw the relationships they were having with female activists in a similar light.

Both Alison and Helen are now 51 and say they are trying to move on with their lives, but with so many unanswered questions, this has proved difficult. One of the many things activists still do not know is why they were targeted in the first place and they hope the inquiry will help to answer many of these questions, but the Met has been criticised for delaying the process.

UCPI

A Met Police spokesman said in a statement to HuffPost UK: “The MPS wishes to assist the Inquiry to fulfil its terms of reference and is responding in line with its timescales and also providing information, including extensive disclosure voluntarily.

“The task is unprecedented given the many thousands of documents and decades of operational activity that the Inquiry is considering. We have a significant team of officers and lawyers who are working hard to provide our fullest possible support.

“Like all concerned, we want the inquiry to progress as swiftly as is possible given the complex and sensitive subject matter it is considering.”

Despite not knowing why they were targeted, both women agree that such deception is never acceptable.

“The reason why there are no circumstances in which it’s ok is because that’s why we’ve got a criminal justice system. If somebody is suspected of doing something you collect the evidence, you charge them and then you prosecute them and then they go through the system. No-one was charged with anything. It was just information gathering,” Alison says.

But there is one unexpected result to have come from the experience.

Helen says: “Without meaning to, through what we have all exposed, they have thrown together some of the most able and some of the most powerful activists in the country coming from completely different angles… this group of people, who were not necessarily working together on stuff, were suddenly in the same room, which is probably their worst nightmare.

“The one thing they don’t want people to do is talking to one another.”

*Alison is a pseudonym to protect her identity.

related:

DOMESTIC SURVEILLANCE - DAYS OF MY LIFE...with spooks.

They also use nondescript very ordinary looking people - including teenage girls to pensioners, both male and female who are recruited to pop along to surveille and watch whoever is deemed a target - I know because ive been witnessing this for months and have been accosted by many of them - particularly young females and older tarty types - possibly prostitutes or ex-prostitutes [often employed by police or connected]....

and

Nearly 1,000 serving police officers and PCSOs have a criminal record

More than 900 serving police officers and community support officers have a criminal record, official figures show.

Nearly 1,000 police officers across the country have a criminal convictionPhoto: ALAMY

9:57AM GMT 02 Jan 2012

Forces across England and Wales employ policemen and women with convictions including burglary, causing death by careless driving, robbery, supplying drugs, domestic violence, forgery and perverting the course of justice.

Those with criminal records include senior officers, among them two detective chief inspectors and one chief inspector working for the Metropolitan Police.

At least 944 currently serving officers and police community support officers (PCSOs) have a conviction, according to figures released by 33 of the 43 forces in England and Wales in response to Freedom of Information requests.

Many forces could not provide details of criminal records dating from before their staff joined the police,meaning the true figure will be significantly higher.

The Metropolitan Police, Britain's largest force, came top with 356 officers and 41 PCSOs with convictions.

Related Articles

02 Jan 2011

01 Jan 2012

31 Dec 2011

It was followed by Kent Police (49), Devon and Cornwall Police (44), Essex Police (42), South Yorkshire Police (35), Hampshire Police (31) and West Midlands Police (27), although not all the figures are directly comparable.

The criminal records include:

Devon and Cornwall Police - a Pc convicted of burglary as a teenager.

Essex Police - one inspector convicted of dangerous driving; another inspector convicted of possessing and supplying cannabis; a detective constable convicted of robbery; a Pc convicted of data protection breaches for viewing intelligence records relating to friends[and how many cops have done this? I know for a fact conversations have taken place between my GP and police re: my being prescribed painkillers / etc....], relatives or other people living in the local area, and aspecial constable convicted of stealing a set of car number plates, putting them on another vehicle and obtaining petrol without paying.

Hertfordshire Police - a sergeant convicted of dangerous driving.

Kent Police - a Pc convicted of perverting the course of justice in 1998.

Merseyside Police - five officers convicted of assault and one convicted of causing death by careless driving.

Norfolk Police - a Pc convicted of causing death by careless driving.

North Wales Police - an officer convicted of forgery.

Surrey Police - a detective constable convicted of obstructing police officers; a Pc convicted of wounding; a Pc convicted of drink driving in 1988 and resisting arrest a decade later, and a Pc convicted of animal suffering in 2006.

Most of the convictions are for traffic offences such as speeding and drink-driving, but the records also include a South

Yorkshire Police officer convicted of fishing without a licence.[lololol...ed.]

Home Office guidelines issued in 2003 say police officers should have ''proven integrity'' because they are vulnerable to pressure from criminals to reveal information.

Tue 30 Jan 2018 11.38 GMTLast modified on Tue 30 Jan 2018 22.01 GMT

Liberty, the human rights campaign group which represented Watson in the case, said the ruling meant significant parts of the Investigatory Powers Act 2016 – known as the snooper’s charter – are effectively unlawful and must be urgently changed.

The court of appeal ruling on Tuesday said the powers in the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act 2014, which paved the way for the snooper’s charter legislation, did not restrict the accessing of confidential personal phone and web browsing records to investigations of serious crime, and allowed police and other public bodies to authorise their own access without adequate oversight.The government defended its use of communications data to fight serious and organised crime and said that the judgment related to out of date legislation. Minister Ben Wallace said that it would not affect the way law enforcement would tackle crime.

The three judges said Dripa was “inconsistent with EU law” because of this lack of safeguards, including the absence of “prior review by a court or independent administrative authority”.

Responding to the ruling, Watson said: “This legislation was flawed from the start. It was rushed through parliament just before recess without proper parliamentary scrutiny.

“The government must now bring forward changes to the Investigatory Powers Act to ensure that hundreds of thousands of people, many of whom are innocent victims or witnesses to crime, are protected by a system of independent approval for access to communications data. I’m proud to have played my part in safeguarding citizens’ fundamental rights.”

Martha Spurrier, the director of Liberty, said: “Yet again a UK court has ruled the government’s extreme mass surveillance regime unlawful. This judgement tells ministers in crystal clear terms that they are breaching the public’s human rights.”

She said no politician was above the law. “When will the government stop bartering with judges and start drawing up a surveillance law that upholds our democratic freedoms?”

The Home Office announced a series of safeguards in November in anticipation of the ruling. They include removing the power of self-authorisation for senior police officers and requiring approval for requests for confidential communications data to be granted by the new investigatory powers commissioner. Watson and other campaigners said the safeguards were “half-baked” and did not go far enough.

The judges, headed by Sir Geoffrey Vos, declined to rule on the Home Office claim that the more rigorous “Watson safeguards” were not necessary for the use of bulk communications data for wider national security purposes.The judges said the appeal court did not need to rule on this point because it had already been referred to the European court of justice in a case which is due to be heard in February.

Watson launched his legal challenge in 2014 in partnership with David Davis, who withdrew when he entered the government as Brexit secretary in 2016. The European court of justice ruled in December 2016 that the “general and indiscriminate retention” of confidential personal communications data was unlawful without safeguards, including independent judicial authorisation.

Security minister Ben Wallace responded to the ruling saying: “Communications data is used in the vast majority of serious and organised crime prosecutions and has been used in every major security service counter-terrorism investigation over the last decade. It is often the only way to identify paedophiles involved in online child abuse as it can be used to find where and when these horrendous crimes have taken place.”

He said the judgment related to legislation which was no longer in force and did not change the way in which law enforcement agencies could detect and disrupt crimes.

“We had already announced that we would be amending the Investigatory Powers Act to address the two areas in which the court of appeal has found against the previous data retention regime. We welcome the fact that the court of appeal ruling does not undermine the regime and we will continue to defend these vital powers, which Parliament agreed were necessary in 2016, in ongoing litigation,” he said.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Now anyone can be hacked by government – going back a year “in police investigations”…yeah right. Bang goes the right of privacy – ECHR Article 8: Article 8 – Right to respect for private and family life1. Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.2. There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_8_of_the_European_Convention_on_Human_Rights]

.

Britain has passed the ‘most extreme surveillance law ever passed in ademocracy’

The law forces UK internet providers to store browsing histories — including domains visited — for one year, in case of police investigations.

Four years and a general election later — May is now prime minister — the bill was finalized and passed on Wednesday by both parliamentary houses.But civil liberties groups have long criticized the bill, with some arguing that the law will let the UK government “document everything we do online”.It’s no wonder, because it basically does.The law will force internet providers to record every internet customer’s top-level web history in real-time for up to a year, which can be accessed by numerous government departments; force companies to decrypt data on demand — though the government has never been that clear on exactly how it forces foreign firms to do that that; and even disclose any new security features in products before they launch.

Not only that, the law also gives the intelligence agencies the power to hack into computers and devices of citizens (known as equipment interference), although some protected professions — such as journalists and medical staff — are layered with marginally better protections.

In other words, it’s the “most extreme surveillance law ever passed in a democracy,” according to Jim Killock, director of the Open Rights Group.

And that doesn’t even account for the three-quarters of people who think privacy, which this law almost entirely erodes, is a human right.

There are some safeguards, however, such as a “double lock” system so that the secretary of state and an independent judicial commissioner must agree on a decision to carry out search warrants (though one member of the House of Lords disputed that claim).

A new investigatory powers commissioner will also oversee the use of the powers.Despite the uproar, the government’s opposition failed to scrutinize any significant amendments and abstained from the final vote. Killock said recently that the opposition Labour party spent its time “simply failing to hold the government to account”.

But the government has downplayed much of the controversy surrounding the bill. The government has consistently argued that the bill isn’t drastically new, but instead reworks the old and outdated Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA). This was brought into law in 2000, to “legitimize” new powers that were conducted or ruled on in secret, like collecting data in bulk and hacking into networks, which was revealed during the Edward Snowden affair.

Much of those activities were only possible thanks to litigation by one advocacy group, Privacy International, which helped push these secret practices into the public domain while forcing the government to scramble to explain why these practices were legal.

The Snooper’s Charter passed into law this week – say goodbye to your privacy

The fact that you’re on this website is – potentially – state knowledge. Service providers must now store details of everything you do online for 12 months – and make it accessible to dozens of public authorities

Saturday 19 November 2016

This week a law was passed that silently rips privacy from the modern world. It’s called the Investigatory Powers Act.

Under the guise of counter-terrorism, the British state has achieved totalitarian-style surveillance powers – the most intrusive system of any democracy in history. It now has the ability to indiscriminately hack, intercept, record, and monitor the communications and internet use of the entire population.

The hundreds of chilling mass surveillance programmes revealed by Edward Snowden in 2013 were – we assumed – the result of a failure of the democratic process. Snowden’s bravery finally gave Parliament and the public the opportunity to scrutinise this industrial-scale spying and bring the state back into check.

But, in an environment of devastatingly poor political opposition, the Government has actually extended state spying powers beyond those exposed by Snowden – setting a “world-leading” precedent.

The fact that you’re on this website is – potentially – state knowledge. Service providers must now store details of everything you do online for 12 months – and make it accessible to dozens of public authorities.

What does your web history look like? Does it reveal your political interests? Social networks? Religious ideas? Medical concerns? Sexual interests? Pattern of life?

What might the last year of your internet use reveal?

Government agencies have even won powers to hack millions of computers, phones and tablets en masse, leaving them vulnerable to further criminal attacks.

You might think that you have nothing to hide, and therefore nothing to fear. In that case, you may as well post your email and social media login details in the comments below.

But I don’t think we do feel that blasé about our privacy – we cherish our civil liberties. Everyone has a stake in guarding our democracy, protecting minorities from suspicionless surveillance, defending protest rights, freedom of the press, and enjoying the freedom to explore and express oneself online. These freedoms allow our thoughts, opinions and personalities to flourish and develop – they are the very core of democracy.

Has any country in history given itself such extensive surveillance powers and remained a rights-respecting democracy? We need not look too far back – or overseas to see the risks of unbridled surveillance. In recent years, the British state has spied on law-abiding environmental activists, democratically elected politicians, victims of torture and police brutality, and hundreds of journalists.

In fact, as the Bill finally passed on Wednesday evening, I was training a group of British and American journalists in how to protect themselves from state surveillance – not just from Russia or Syria, but from their own countries.

When Edward Snowden courageously blew the whistle on mass surveillance he warned that, armed with such tools, a new leader might “say that ‘because of the crisis, because of the dangers we face in the world, some new and unpredicted threat, we need more authority, we need more power.’ And there will be nothing the people can do at that point to oppose it”.

The US finds itself with a President-elect who has committed to monitoring all mosques, banning all Muslims, investigating Black Lives Matter activists and deporting two to three million people. And with the ushering into law of the UK-US free trade in mass surveillance, MPs may have a lot to answer for.

Liberty and its members fought tooth and nail against this new law from its inception to the moment it was passed. That fight is not yet over. Our message to Government: see you in court.

Russia and China were among countries opposing the resolution, which reaffirms the stance of the UN Human Rights Council that “the same rights people have offline must also be protected online.”

Saudi Arabia joined the two nations in their objections. But in addition to authoritarian regimes, democracies such as India and South Africa also disagreed and called for the deletion of the following passage:“Condemns unequivocally measures to intentionally prevent or disrupt access to or dissemination of information online in violation of international human rights law and calls on all States to refrain from and cease such measures.”

While not legally enforceable, a resolution such as this can help put pressure on governments and add weight to the arguments of digital rights groups.

Digital rights site Access Now’s Global Policy and Legal Counsel representative, Peter Micek, enlarged on this.“This unanimous statement by the world’s highest human rights body should give governments pause before they order blocking, throttling, and other barriers to information.”

Access Now says at least 15 Internet shutdowns took place worldwide in 2015. So far in 2016, at least 20 shutdowns are known to have been put into place.

A major row between the political parties is brewing over demands by David Cameron and the intelligence services for even more surveillance powers in the wake of the terrorist atrocities in Paris last week.David Cameron has promised new legislation so that terrorists no longer have “safe spaces” to communicate.Pointing out that in the old days, intelligence agencies were able to open letters and eavesdrop on phone calls, the PM asked in a speech yesterday: “In our country, do we want to allow a means of communication between people which […] we cannot read?”But today deputy PM Nick Clegg said such a response would be disproportionate and would “cross a line”.The issue centres on the fact that technology is changing so fast that the laws on which security officials rely to give them access to communications are becoming obsolete almost as soon as they are written.Here the Bureau explains why new legislation passed last summer is said to be already inadequate to keep Britons safe, what the government could do next and why the public debate must take account of GCHQ’s most realistic option – hacking.What are the problems?The Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act (DRIPA) was only passed last summer, having been fast-tracked through Parliament.The new law extended the reach of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) which gives authorities interception powers.Under DRIPA telecoms companies can also be required to keep billing data – information on who contacts whom, when and for how long on mobile networks but not the content of these messages – for up to 12 months and allow security officials to access it on production of a warrant.This “meta-data” held by the companies is helpful in identifying associates of known terrorists or criminals. Law enforcement and security officials can use evidence of contact between parties to justify directly surveilling individuals and accessing the content of their communications.But the law is already said to be becoming obsolete.There are three main reasons for this:1) People aren’t calling each other over mobile networks as often as they used toTerrorists and serious criminals, like the general public, are using the internet to communicate instead, speaking to each other via social media sites, instant messaging services – including those provided by online games – and chat rooms.Billing data doesn’t capture these exchanges.2) EncryptionIntelligence agencies are increasingly finding that even when they have located the particular messages they want, the content is encrypted.3) The data isn’t collected by UK telcosCompanies operating fixed line and mobile infrastructure such as BT and Vodafone may simply transport data to and from another company – such as Facebook or Twitter – to the customer with little or no data retained about the communication.4) Some of the communications the spies want access to are held by service providers that are not based in the UKUnder DRIPA, interception warrants issued by UK authorities can be applied to overseas firms. As Liberty pointed out, the UK’s Home Secretary could serve Gmail with a warrant in California, requiring it to intercept all communications between subscribers in two specified countries or all communications leaving or entering the UK.However many legal experts have questioned the validity of this extra-territorial effect, not least because the legislation could require companies to breach their own nation’s laws in complying with a UK warrant – a warrant whose existence they could not reveal without breaking UK law.A recent Telegraph report quoted an anonymous security official complaining that these companies would not assist GCHQ enquires by passing on evidence about serious criminals unless there was an imminent threat of harm.What can be done about it?1) Get heavy with the tech companiesMedia reports have suggested Whatsapp, Snapcat and Apple’s iMessage, which offer an encrypted instant messaging services could be banned from the UK.Companies that offer encrypted email services could also be banned or required to hand over their encryption “keys”, either to the security services or to network operators.Operators could then be required by law to decrypt the data.As Privacy International points out, proposals to outlaw encrypted communications “not only threaten the very rights they’re said to be designed to protect, but begin from a fundamentally flawed premise – that such measures are even possible.”It added: “The UK simply can not command foreign manufacturers and providers of services such as Whatsapp to modify their services to accommodate the desires of British spies.”Any attempted move in this direction would antagonise some very powerful opponents – Google, for example, which recently proposed that websites that do not encrypt their traffic be marked as “insecure” by default.The company is a major advocate for “end-to-end encryption“, which encrypts data leaving a user’s browser until it is decrypted by the recipient. The tech giant has previously publicly announced support for anti-surveillance campaigners.In 2010 the Indian government threatened to ban Blackberry for refusing to allow the country’s security officials access to its messages. The dispute ran for several years before ending in a compromise, with the company agreeing to allow more limited access – to meta-data – than had originally been requested.A battle between the UK and Google or Apple would be a different matter altogether.2) Revival of the “Snoopers’ Charter”The Conservatives are pushing for a revival of the Communications Data draft Bill, known as the “Snoopers’ Charter”, which was abandoned in 2013 after opposition from the Liberal Democrats.This would have required all internet service providers to retain, for 12 months, in a common format data on their customers’ communications via the internet as well as via the mobile networks.Data stored would include visits to websites and social media activities.These databases could then be searched by a Government data-mining device called a “request filter”.As well as major concerns about the threat to privacy this would entail, it is questionable whether the national security benefits would justify the expense of building and maintaining the data storage centers necessary to retain this huge amount of information, particularly if the encryption problem has not been solved.Companies that have no commercial imperative to collect the information would have to be compensated if they were compelled to do so. The bill could run into hundreds of millions of pounds given the volume and complexity of data involved.3) Hack!The third prong in the intelligence agencies’ communications surveillance trident is its ability to break encryption by hacking.GCHQ’s capabilities in this and any other regard are never discussed officially as a matter of policy.But without understanding this capability – and how, if at all, it is constrained by the law – it is difficult to know just how hampered the security services are.Documents leaked in 2013 by National Security Agency (NSA) whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed that US and UK intelligence agencies have been pouring their efforts into cracking encryption codes for many years.A Guardian report that year quoted a 2010 NSA presentation as stating that “for the past decade, NSA has led an aggressive, multipronged effort to break widely used internet encryption technologies.”A more recent report in German newspaper Der Spiegel based on a set of Snowden files dated 2012 showed that the NSA considered monitoring Facebook chat “a minor task”. On the other hand a protocol called Off-the-Record (OTR) for encrypting instant messaging seemed to be causing the NSA major problems.Facebook has improved its security since 2012 but it’s likely that intelligence agencies’ hacking powers have improved in tandem.GCHQ hacking may also explain why the government wants companies to store data that is currently unreadable due to encryption.As yet another Snowden file says: “Vast amounts of encrypted Internet data which have up till now been discarded are now exploitable.”Once an encrypted system has been hacked into, intelligence agencies can re-examine stored data to find information that was previously hidden – a powerful motive for retaining data.The Snowden documents also revealed that NSA and its “Five Eyes” partners including the UK had adopted covert measures to ensure control over setting of international encryption standards, the use of supercomputers to break encryption with “brute force”.Through covert partnerships with internet service providers and tech companies, the agencies had also inserted secret vulnerabilities known as backdoors into commercial encryption software.“These design changes make the systems in question exploitable … to the consumer and other adversaries, however, the systems’ security remains intact,” one document says.Since this was made public, the companies concerned may have become less willing to enter into these collaborations.Related story: Thatcher and Blair Cabinet Secretary: Intelligence committee has “helped” public by confirming GCHQ’s internet tap “Tempora” powerssource: https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2015-01-13/a-guide-to-state-surveillance-the-snoopers-charter-and-government-hacking

Sunday, 6 August 2017

UNDERCOVER COPS: An inquiry just revealed how far the British state will go in its secret war on citizens + OVER 1000 POLICE HAVE CRIMINAL RECORDS

The cover names of three police officers who spied on political activists have just been revealed by an inquiry into undercover policing. The three officers infiltrated high-profile campaigns at a time of great public anger.Inquiry documents and secret intelligence reports reveal just how far the state went to undermine opposition to injustices. And understanding the response to that overreach is crucial to understanding what’s happening now.

A time of wars and strikes

The three undercover officers (UCOs) were assigned with the Special Demonstration Squad (SDS) and were operational from 1968 to 1976. They (cover names) are Rick Gibson [pdf] (deceased), Douglas Edwards [pdf] and John Graham [pdf]. An outline of their undercover activities is given in each document. The three infiltrated a number of political campaigns and organisations, including [pdf]Troops Out Movement, Vietnam Solidarity Campaign and anarchist groups. At the time, Britain was engaged in military operations in Northern Ireland that saw 13 civilians killed by British troops on ‘Bloody Sunday’. Britain’s ‘dirty war’ in the country reportedly left many more dead. Britain was also actively supporting the US in its war on Vietnam. But the authorities had not appreciated the level of discontent this would cause. And on 17 March 1968 a mass rally at Trafalgar Square saw 8000 of the protesters break off to head for the US embassy at Grosvenor Square. The ensuing battle was a key moment, with 300 protesters arrested:

But the police learned lessons from Grosvenor Square. And ahead of a follow-up demo in October of that year, a Special Branch document provided a list of around 50 ‘leaders’. While another report revealed anticipated numbers of activists; and properties that could be targeted. Such intelligence would undoubtedly be useful to UCOs.

Beyond protest

But the state feared far more than mere protests and another Special Branch document warned of revolution:This assessment was not far off the truth. For the militancy on the streets was followed by another form of resistance.The Angry Brigade appeared from nowhere, but carried out highly targeted attacks on government and police properties:

Journalist Martin Bright summed up the political climate the AB existed in:

It is difficult now to imagine the intensity of the times. Edward Heath was locked into a lengthy dispute with workers who occupied the Clydeside shipyards in Glasgow, which would eventually end with a humiliating climb down for the government. Internment was introduced in Northern Ireland and the Bloody Sunday massacre of civil-rights marchers in January 1972 happened while the Angry Brigade suspects were awaiting trial. One document found in the raids across London that weekend brought the three causes together in a mini-manifesto: ‘Put the boot in – Bogside, Clydeside – Support the Angry side’.

Back to the future

The SDS was not just a child of the 60s and 70s, its work and that of other undercover policing units continued over subsequent decades. And Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary subsequently revealed that a massive 3,466 undercover operations took place in England and Wales between 2009 and 2013 alone.The Undercover Policing Inquiry was set up in 2015 to examine some of the practices deployed by these units[is he serious?...ed....he's trying to be!...Ned.]. But it’s taken two years for a small number of cover names of UCOs to be released. The inquiry will reveal more in due course, though as The Canary reported many undercover policing files have gone ‘missing’. [well, there's a surprise...NOT!..ed.].Citizen activists are demanding real names should be released too. Because many UCOs formed sexual relationships as part of their cover. Indeed, former UCO Andy Coles (his real name) was exposed earlier this year – not by the inquiry, but by independent researchers. And now he is under pressure to resign as councillor with Peterborough City Council. The inquiry has agreed the then young woman he’s alleged to have exploited will be a ‘core participant’ in its investigation.Regardless of the difference in technologies used, there are clear parallels between the political policing of earlier decades and of today. Moreover, public anger about the same injustices is no less palpable.Get involved!– Check outUndercover Research GroupandCampaign Against Police Surveillance.Featured image via screengrab.source: https://www.thecanary.co/2017/08/05/inquiry-just-revealed-far-british-state-go-secret-war-citizens-videos/

UNDERCOVER COPS: The Women Activists Who Fell In Love With Police Spies And Are Still Waiting For Justice

‘I suddenly realised after he had gone that I had no way of tracing him.’

What Police Spies Out of Lives want at the end of the inquiry

The cover names of the officers involved in undercover policing from 1968 onwards to be released.

Nearly 1,000 serving police officers and PCSOs have a criminal record

More than 900 serving police officers and community support officers have a criminal record, official figures show.

Nearly 1,000 police officers across the country have a criminal convictionPhoto: ALAMY

9:57AM GMT 02 Jan 2012

Forces across England and Wales employ policemen and women with convictions including burglary, causing death by careless driving, robbery, supplying drugs, domestic violence, forgery and perverting the course of justice.

Those with criminal records include senior officers, among them two detective chief inspectors and one chief inspector working for the Metropolitan Police.

At least 944 currently serving officers and police community support officers (PCSOs) have a conviction, according to figures released by 33 of the 43 forces in England and Wales in response to Freedom of Information requests.

Many forces could not provide details of criminal records dating from before their staff joined the police,meaning the true figure will be significantly higher.

The Metropolitan Police, Britain's largest force, came top with 356 officers and 41 PCSOs with convictions.

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01 Jan 2012

31 Dec 2011

It was followed by Kent Police (49), Devon and Cornwall Police (44), Essex Police (42), South Yorkshire Police (35), Hampshire Police (31) and West Midlands Police (27), although not all the figures are directly comparable.

The criminal records include:

Devon and Cornwall Police - a Pc convicted of burglary as a teenager.

Essex Police - one inspector convicted of dangerous driving; another inspector convicted of possessing and supplying cannabis; a detective constable convicted of robbery; a Pc convicted of data protection breaches for viewing intelligence records relating to friends[and how many cops have done this? I know for a fact conversations have taken place between my GP and police re: my being prescribed painkillers / etc....], relatives or other people living in the local area, and aspecial constable convicted of stealing a set of car number plates, putting them on another vehicle and obtaining petrol without paying.

Hertfordshire Police - a sergeant convicted of dangerous driving.

Kent Police - a Pc convicted of perverting the course of justice in 1998.

Merseyside Police - five officers convicted of assault and one convicted of causing death by careless driving.

Norfolk Police - a Pc convicted of causing death by careless driving.

North Wales Police - an officer convicted of forgery.

Surrey Police - a detective constable convicted of obstructing police officers; a Pc convicted of wounding; a Pc convicted of drink driving in 1988 and resisting arrest a decade later, and a Pc convicted of animal suffering in 2006.

Most of the convictions are for traffic offences such as speeding and drink-driving, but the records also include a South

Yorkshire Police officer convicted of fishing without a licence.[lololol...ed.]

Home Office guidelines issued in 2003 say police officers should have ''proven integrity'' because they are vulnerable to pressure from criminals to reveal information.

ROGER PEARCE aka THORLEY #spycops + UNDERCOVER COPS: An inquiry just revealed how far the British state will go in its secret war on citizens + OVER 1000 POLICE HAVE CRIMINAL RECORDS + “True Spies” VIDEO